


The Inverted

by TheQuiet1



Category: Hawaii Five-0 (2010)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Sentinels and Guides Are Known, Consent Issues, Empathy, Forced military service, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Politics, Slow Burn, Violence
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-10-30
Updated: 2019-11-05
Packaged: 2021-01-13 01:22:49
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 15,301
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21235814
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheQuiet1/pseuds/TheQuiet1
Summary: “Steve, if you go in there waving your gun and yelling - “Steve grates out. “Trust me, I’m not getting close. I’m standing guard. Right outside Danny’s door, but yes thank you, there’s going to be plenty of shouting going on.”





	1. Tuesday the 12TH - 08:47am

**Author's Note:**

> This is loosely based on the concepts of The Sentinel, then does a sharp left turn and runs amok. Very amok.

Steve’s truck is already outside the Palace when Danny pulls up.

He finds a space further along and parks the Camaro between Chin’s bike and a decrepit silver Hyundai. The parrots are squawking overhead, fighting for dominance in a tree, briefly, Danny worries about bird-shit on his car before deciding the shade’s worth it. Hawaii’s in a state of flux: ready to spit rain, shine with sun, or toss a multi-hued rainbow into the mix, the only thing it doesn’t do is drop its temperature below eighty-five degrees. Fingers drumming against the steering wheel, Danny peers up at headquarters before he swings the door open and legs it out.

A kid skates by, school backpack dangling from one strap, hair streaming behind her. Across the road, a woman - waiting under the shade of a banyan tree - walks toward him. “Detective Williams? Flight-Sergeant Lisa Williams,” she introduces. “Not related.”

“Well, it would have explained my parent’s divorce attempt.” Lisa’s early twenties, dressed in civilian clothes. Danny’s seen enough off-duty personnel to recognise military when he sees one. Her hair’s styled in a pixie cut; grey eyes a shade lighter than normal, close enough to white to be disconcerting. “May I help you?”

“I hope so.” Lisa’s smile turns professionally fake. “I’m with Sentinel and Guide Affairs, I was wondering if I could ask a few questions.”

He doesn’t stutter or take a large step back, he doesn’t even slide into his Camaro again. Points for acting style. “SAGA? That acronym has to be the butt of a few jokes.”

“You have no idea. May I have a moment of your time?”

Danny turns the keys over in his hand; one arm draped over the body of the car, fingertips brushing the door handle. He keeps his expression neutral, uses some therapy tricks to lower his heart rate – calm; calmly - because Steve’s not the only sentinel on the island. If Danny thinks of his mind as a castle - with a watery moat filled with angry dragons, a drawbridge pierced through with spikes - then that drawbridge is pulling up tight. “Is this about Steve?” It has to be; if it weren’t, SAGA would have sent more than one person.

“My partner is conducting an interview with Commander McGarrett. We’re running an assessment on his mental acuity, as well as apex levels.”

“Apex level of what?”

“Aggression. Possessiveness.”

Danny pulls a face. “Don’t let him know I said this because I’ll never hear the end of it, but Steve’s not out of control.”

Lisa looks at him dubiously. “He requested a guide recently.”

Indignantly, the parrots squawk. Danny stirs, feet shuffling against the pavement as he readjusts his balance. “Let me guess: Catherine, right?”

“Off the record, yes. I’d like to ask about her.”

Agonised, Danny wants to say no, hell no; but that means SAGA would circle back in a more official capacity and he doesn’t want to draw attention. Danny’s been a cop half his life; he knows how to disperse suspicion. “Sure, let’s make it quick.”

“You’ve known Lieutenant Rollins four years?”

“Shortly after meeting Steve, yeah.”

“How would you describe her?”

“Competent. Excellent at her job,” Danny shrugs, adding thoughtfully: “She has a lot in common with McGarrett, the same sense of humour, the same interests. They’re cute.”

“Would you say she’s reflecting?”

Danny stares at her like a putz; projecting hugely confused and dumb.

Lisa frowns impatiently. “We categorise sentinel’s from one to five, depending on the number of enhanced senses they possess. Commander McGarrett, as you know, came on-line as a Category Two after his mother’s death. Enhanced hearing and sight. He was stable until North Korea, where he jumped up two levels to a Category Four post rescue. It’s thought the stress, physical trauma, manifested both touch and taste, as well as the pre-existing sight and hearing.”

“Yeah,” Danny says tightly. “We were there.”

“We rate guides similarly. Except it’s based on their empathy levels: how powerfully they shield their minds from other people’s emotions and - when those shields are forcibly lowered - how deeply they ‘reflect’ their sentinel.”

Also, if they’re capable of projecting, but the government’s not too keen on advertising that particular facet and Lisa neglects to mention it in its entirety. Empathy is like a well-hung mirror, Danny’s mother used to say. Don’t lower your shields. Don’t get trapped inside of it. Don’t let a sentinel imprint on you…because sweetheart, you’ll imprint on them. You’ll do whatever they want - because hey! - it’s what you want too. You’ll _reflect_. Together, you’ll become the perfect team. And that –

-that’s what the military wants.

“No,” Danny says. “I don’t think so. Obviously I can’t tell how well Cath shields but her personality is consistent, regardless of who she’s with. I wouldn’t say she’s unduly influenced. She is who she is.”

“Would you say the Lieutenant is a good match for Commander McGarrett? Personality-wise?”

“I’d say my opinion doesn’t matter,” Danny says, exasperated. “Catherine’s does.” He waits a beat then adds pointedly: “Does Cath want to bond?”

“Until recently, no. Lieutenant Rollins has consistently requested the emergency rotation for Category 1’s and C2’s only. Given the quality of her work in intelligence we were happy to oblige. If she agrees to the McGarrett match, though, the Navy will reassign her. You neglected to mention Steve.” Lisa tilts her head curiously. “Does his opinion not count?”

“Okay, let’s put aside individuals and look at the bigger picture. Steve was raised by an Institution that heaped a sense of importance upon him. He’s a very special cupcake. SEAL training beat a lot of that crap out of him but most sentinel’s I’ve met swagger around with a sense of entitlement – guides are possessions - and that’s the type of ego that makes me want to punch someone.”

“You empathise with guides?”

“I relate to the victims.” There’s an edge to his voice. “It makes me a good detective.”

She looks personally affronted, standing upright with her shoulders back. “SAGA was set up to protect guides, you know, as well as the sentinels who serve our nation.”

“Yeah, I’ve heard that reasoning, but anyone who steals kids from their families has a poor definition of love. The government cares more about the war machine, less about the fodder, and while the law is happy to uphold the rights of the majority, minority groups are never afforded the same civil protections, are they? Sentinels and guides were designated a sub-branch of the human species, circa 1921 – as unique to baseline humans as the Neanderthals or the Denisovans were.” Danny’s tone becomes derisive, louder, gearing up for an argument. “As for SAGA’s protection: you find some poor kid - who comes on-line for the first time and zones himself into a coma - and the government plucks him up like a low-hanging fruit. Military boarding school until eighteen, then mandatory service for four years in whatever branch of the armed forces deemed necessary. They can opt out at twenty-two, start a civilian life, but eighty-seven per cent of their numbers reenlist. That’s not a boon for the military? The governments commitment to locating sentinels from adolescence is noted and in my opinion…questionable.”

“It’s not all that humble, is it, your opinion?” Lisa blows air out between her cheeks, irritated. “Let me guess, you were delivered by mid-wife instead of at a hospital? Was your mother a hippy, Detective? A Vietnam war protestor?”

Danny looks at her evenly. “She taught medieval studies at Monmouth University.”

“Funny. Mine taught criminal history. Did you know DNA testing was first used as evidence in the American courts in 1987, to convict rapist Tommie Lee Andrews? The military has been picking up your ‘low hanging fruit’ since before World War Two, providing sentinels with a much needed sense of _worth_ and _purpose_. They do better with a structured environment and comparatively speaking they _are_ easy to identify. Guides though – especially those born before 1987 - have always been harder to locate.”

“Interesting; but it doesn’t feel like we’re chatting about Catherine anymore.”

The sun clears out from behind the cloud line, shining hot and sticky on the wet pavement. A rainbow springs up.

Danny _hates_ Hawaii.

Danny’s hated Hawaii before he ever stepped foot on it.

If it weren’t for Grace he’d be off this volcanic rock in a heartbeat. Danny came from a state with over eight million, nine hundred thousand citizens; in an area of land almost double the size of Oahu. New Jersey had excellent food; great music. It had seasons that were distinct from one another. It had the extended Williams clan – who were messy and loud - and loved one another unconditionally. In New Jersey it was easy to get lost in the shuffle.

Until he met Rachel and they had Grace. Until they fell apart.

Then suddenly he was living in a fishbowl with a population under a million: on an Island with no less than _eleven_ military bases on it. The place was crawling with sentinels, guides, and SAGA personnel.

The government might have been slow to identify the enhanced empathy gene in their human ‘sub-branch’ - but sentinels had been successfully identifying guides for centuries. Danny’s never had the wherewithal to ask Rachel if she had chosen it on purpose; if she had been that spiteful after the divorce. Either way; Danny spent most of his early days one fit away from a heart attack.

He’d follow Meka with his shoulders high; his castle walls brimming with armaments, his empathy locked down so tight it felt like his skull was compressing. When he met Steve in the garage, the other man was broadcasting, he fairly rattled Danny’s windows with the violence of it.

It didn’t matter if Danny triple-bolted the doors: gusts of emotion (grief/anger) drafted through every castle room. It didn’t take empathy to say ‘I’m sorry for your loss, man,’ and mean it, that was common decency.

It was easy to be cooperative when Steve barged into his home and demanded all the evidence and hard work Danny had achieved on the case. Danny didn’t posture, or become snide. He simply handed over the facts as he had collected them. It wasn’t about ego, or who took credit for what, it was about the job. It was about John McGarrett.

He took issue to being press-ganged into the Five-0 task force though.

By the time they were making their way toward Doran’s residence, Steve’s broadcast of grief/guilt/loss was like a continual flurry of arrows being shot over Danny’s battlements and he may have caved. A little. Lowered his drawbridge while on the phone with Gracie, until he could project love/devoted/reassurance out and see the other man relax, as if by osmosis. They were good until McGarrett took Danny into a submission hold – like every childhood nightmare of being identified - and screw the fiery arrows, Danny hit back with a catapult.

His fortifications were solid after that, thank you.

He spent the car ride back fuming. It was stupid, letting his guard down near Steve, even for a second. The government wanted sentinels for the military; and sentinels needed guides. Danny’s own opinion on the subject had been formulated young: mostly, it consisted of ‘no’ and ‘god no.’

He was fully resolved to ignoring McGarrett until the Hesse case was resolved. Hopefully by then the man would fluff off to the Navy again and Danny could return to HPD. A road trip in absolute silence seemed like the ticket except Steve turned around in his seat, voice mild, the mischief in his eyes absolutely not, and said: You’re kind of sensitive, aren’t you?

And BANG. The car was no longer silent.

Danny’s plan might have gone up in flames but Steve watched him with the avarice of a man who loved explosions, who couldn’t get enough of them, his entire body contorted so he could get a first-hand view, and that pretty much cemented their relationship. Steve didn’t return to the Navy, when he gave his word to the Governor he meant it, and the casework in HPD didn’t have the same allure for Danny.

Like most unpaired sentinels, Steve couldn’t shield to save himself. He was a brick façade on the outside – a Navy SEAL poster-boy - and a lunatic party on the inside.

If the party included depressants, histrionics based on an inability to suss out his father’s Champ-box, and a near fanatical need to solve the cases presented to Five-0 with all of the ‘means’ and none of the Miranda rights. He was a volatile mess. The dichotomy between inward and outward appearances had Danny on tenterhooks, side-eyeing Steve from the passenger seat; arguing loudly, just to be a dick and surface some of those emotional undercurrents. But afterward Steve was handing over two nights worth of accommodation, awkwardly, determined to make the effort; Steve was getting affronted and pissy when Danny tried to say no; Steve was hanging out at Danny’s office door, saying, “Bring her to the game, man, c’mon, it’ll be fun,” muscling in on Danny’s off-work time with his precious daughter. And he was shaking Gracie’s hand with a huge paw; bright-eyed as he declared. “It’s good to finally meet you. Danno talks about you a lot.” And the thing is – Steve was happy to meet her, excited to include Gracie - not a hint of duplicity in sight.

Steve was soul-sore, wounded.

But he was also curious, determined, endlessly brave: and as the days rolled into weeks, flashes of joy became prominent - mirthful and bright - until Danny couldn’t look away from that kind of transition. He was screwed. From day one.

“My partner and I were doing follow-up interviews with co-workers like yourself,” Lisa announces. “Ex-military, police: also people who had cause to complain about any heavy-handedness a sentinel might bring.” Jesus, Danny hopes she hadn’t heard about the shark-tank. “One of our interviewees said Steve zoned in North Korea? After he was hit over the head with a rifle?”

“First of all: why are you talking to Wo Fat? Secondly: why would you believe anything, and I mean anything, that came out of that man’s mouth? And lastly, check the report. The zone happened at the hospital in Hawaii _after_ Steve was rescued.”

“Or perhaps he zoned twice?” Lisa queries. Her eyes flick over Danny’s face quickly. “You were the first person to see Commander McGarrett in North Korea. Did you notice anything unusual?”

Steve had seized in the back of the truck like a shock victim, as if the taser’s were still present, held against his skin. His mind was ‘loud’ - a static buzz of electricity – amped up but with nothing familiar there. Nothing of his friend.

It was all white noise and hurt. _Hurt_. A conflagration of misfiring nerves, running along the upper dermis, and Jesus that wasn’t right. Steve was a C2, a two-fer. Touch wasn’t one of his enhanced senses, touch shouldn’t be caught in a feedback loop of memory and sensation.

Danny hauled himself into the truck and skidded over the boards to get to him, pressed both palms against Steve’s cheeks and held on. Steve’s jaw was clenched, by some miracle he hadn’t bitten his own tongue off. He smelt like stress and B.O, like two horrible days in the jungle. Steve’s bare feet, his long toes, kept skittering across the wooden boards. Forehead to forehead, Danny’s used the same tone when comforting Grace. “Hey, hush. Hush now,” until the juddering eased.

Blind, Steve pressed upward, grinding their skulls together painfully. It hurt. Danny could feel every ridge of bone against his temple, as if Steve were trying to crawl inside his head. His hands, coiled in rope, were fisted in Dannys T-shirt . “Easy, babe,” Danny soothed. “Ssh. Ease up now.” Static and iron, blood running hot down his throat, the taste of it putrid until Danny pushed the impression away. Deliberately, Danny thought about Steve standing in his office, goofy and at ease, saying mockingly, ‘I’ll think about you every day,’ thought about Steve relaxed and languid, muscles loose, sprawled out on his lanai under the noon sun.

Long seconds ticked away. Thirty. Sixty. Ninety. The cords in Steve’s neck relaxed, allowing his head to lower to the dirty boards again. The harsh static gave way; confusion rising in its stead. Steve was fighting his way toward lucidity but he wasn’t there yet. More so now, Danny was wary of being jabbed in the throat by an elbow, accidentally killed by some wild ninja move, but Steve only clung to his t-shirt tighter. He whuffed out a harsh breath; then chased it with an inhale. His mouth was slack against Danny’s throat, open and hot. His tongue pressed against the carotid, withdrew. Danny shivered; the second-hand impression of blood and iron in his mouth replaced by something new and that was awkward, that was just weird. Danny closed it off, shut the connection down as gently as he could. The position they were in was hazardous, he was hyper aware of the shouts coming from outside, the staccato of bullets fired in short bursts. Clean up duty coming to an end. Steve was no longer in agony, being tortured, the feedback loop halted, but they couldn’t be found like this. Not by the team, certainly not by Joe.

“Come on, you know me, ” Danny encouraged. Naval dress blues at Meka’s funeral and he had felt a throb of gratitude when Steve had said those very words to him. “Yeah… You know me.”

“D- danny – “ Steve slurred and squinted one eye open. Finally aware.

Danny had smiled lopsidedly, fingers twitching against Steve’s cheek in acknowledgment, a quick there and gone caress. Steve moved, body hitching, the enhanced sense still too new, too raw. The motion was sexless, unco-ordinated. Danny took the hint and pulled away, careful of Steve’s ribs, his state of confusion. He was good. Steve was fine. Whatever wasn’t fine could be sorted out later, with the docs at Tripler.

The jarring static of a deep zone defused.

Steve was staring. The moisture in the corner of his eyes made them sea-green, and he was emanating a sense of ‘wild disbelief’. And yeah, okay. That was insulting. Danny wasn’t sure where to focus, that Steve thought so little of his team and their ingenuity - or that he thought so little of his own worth - the idea of anyone coming for him shocking. They were having words after this. At volume. Danny wanted a microphone. He forced himself to look away and hollered: “Hey! It’s Steve! Steve’s in here!” The dimwit.

Steve flinched. Hearing askew.

Two faces crowded the rear of the truck, jockeying to get a better view. Steve went from semi glazed to alert. He relaxed when recognition set in, gaze landing on Joe. Some of the disbelief eased from his features, as if Steve had decided to accept reality based on Joe White’s presence alone. “Where’s Wo Fat?”

“Shuddup,” Danny muttered, and went about unwinding the rope.

Joe White was the team leader of their expedition; he’d also been trained as a Touchstone in the SEALs and he took over in the chopper with calm authority. He situated Steve between his knees, one hand firm on his shoulder. He shook Steve regularly, squeezing the trapezius muscle, gentle reminders to ‘stay’. Joe shoved a rifle into Steve’s hands like the world’s worse pacifier and let the other man grab it, too quickly, too desperate. Steve pulled the bolt, checked the round, then rolled his neck, looking around distractedly until his gaze locked on Danny.

Danny’s shields were half-lowered, projecting calm when he remembered to, but mostly he forgot and radiated relief.

Steve’s face cracked into a grin, manic, every incisor showing. The chopper dipped. Chin was talking about marriage, everyone else imploring him not to, and Danny had to sit on his hands to stop from crawling over, to take over from Joe.

He pulls away from the memory, squinting up at the fast moving cloud-line as he obfuscates: “Steve seemed fine in the back of the truck. Dazed. I cussed him out for being an idiot, par on course for us.”

“You seem dismissive of Wo Fat’s claim.”

“It’s Wo Fat’s word against Steve’s. I’d put my money on the sentinel. Besides, no one in the rescue party is a guide. Joe was the closest thing we had.”

“Touchstones help prevent a zone; they can’t stop one that’s already in progress.”

“Exactly. Steve had been tortured, he lost consciousness for a brief period of time. Maybe Wo Fat mistook it for a zone; maybe he’s stirring up trouble? Who knows? The guy’s an asshole. Steve said he zoned at Tripler when he went in for proper medical treatment, after the team left. I believe him. Do you have any reason not to?”

Lisa’s phone buzzes. She answers it with one finger raised in apology, hums an answer, then hangs up. “My partner’s interview has finished. Just one more question for you, Detective: and of a personal note. What’s your opinion on imprints?”

Danny raises an eyebrow. He repeats the word slowly.

“Civilians use the term ‘bonds’ but sentinel’s prefer the lexicology of ‘imprint’. It has less connotations.”

“I think the concept of bonds pumped up the skin industry. _Sentinel in Seattle_ was a personal favourite.”

“That’s a terrible porn film,” Lisa says.

Danny laughs. It gives him a precious second to organise his thoughts, to sink into public viewpoint. “I’m not part of Steve’s culture, obviously. I’m only looking at the animals from the other side of the fence-line.”

Lisa’s calm demeanour falters and Danny skims over her intent unobtrusively. She’s a Category Three at most, which is high for a military guide, and pissed at the insult. Her eyes narrow before she can lock the annoyance away.

“I think the promise of forever is a nice fantasy - but the reality is different. A connection based on instinct is just that. No higher emotion. My wife and I might not have worked out but I can remember how I felt about her. How much I loved her on our wedding day. I can still touch the emotion: now some of the anger’s bled away. The mistakes I made – and there were plenty – were mine too. I own them. It gave me Gracie. It allowed me to change, to grow up as a person. Choice means something. Choice is everything. And I chose her. Where’s the same freedom in a bond? Where’s the affection, if it’s a forced imperative? Male and female, gay or lesbian, sentinel and guide, I don’t care, none of it should be policed by the State. Consent is the only thing that does matters.”

“I think you’re right,” Lisa says stiffly. “You don’t know our culture.”

“You’re a sentinel?” Danny hazards - playing up the social faux pas.

“A guide, Category One,” Lisa admits.

And a lying liar who lies; smart, downplaying her ability like that. Not as skilled as Danny though; he’s had decades to perfect ‘low-key’. Lisa was born in the early nineties; she has some grit to her psyche but not much finesse. She hasn’t stopped scanning Danny since the informal discussion started, and that’s a point of worry, the whole North Korea angle is a point of worry. “Sorry. I didn’t mean to offend,” Danny offers – and the thing is – he _is_ sorry.

Sorry Lisa was raised in an institution. Sorry Lisa’s parents didn’t disobey the law. Sorry she was raised with all those other stolen kids – kids like Steve – who thought FUBAR was situation normal.

Grace isn’t a guide, her empathy level is human normal. Her empathy level is perfect, because Grace is perfect. But in four years time, if she manifests as a sentinel instead – if she still takes after Danny’s genetics rather than Rachel’s – then Danny’s doesn’t give a fuck. He’ll snatch her wrist and bolt.

He’ll kill anyone who tries to take her.

He’ll protect her – diligently - until Grace can develop her own opinions. Until she’s old enough to make informed decisions. Danny will die to keep her safe. It’s what every parent should do. He’s never understood how John McGarrett – and his like - stood aside and handed their children over like it was nothing.

“Was that all you wanted?” Danny presses. “We’re done now?”

“Thank you for your time.” Lisa shakes his hand briskly, then crosses the street to where a white van is parallel parked.

Danny turns his head to follow her progress.

His skin feels itchy; heart rate escalating.

Steve’s never, in four years, given any indication he wants another guide.

There’s a part of Danny that wants to slide into the Camaro and take off. Leave immediately. He’s unnerved by the questions, but if Lisa’s any good at her job then she’s sitting behind those darkened windows in the van, waiting for his reaction.

Danny raises his head skyward, eyes closed. The colours behind his eyelids transition as the sunlight wavers, creeping between the outstretched branches of the tree, going from arterial red to shell-pink. The birds have quieted. They’re worried about their sentinel, Danny reminds himself, their sentinel who requested a guide for the first time since Freddie Hart died. Their questions have nothing to do with you: don’t get paranoid now. He resets his shoulders, pushes away from the Camaro, and heads to work.

Chin and Kono are already inside when Danny pushes through the glass doors.

Background information on Christian Ocher – unhappy husband of their most recent victim – covers the entire wall display.

Kono’s in her office, scoffing down a breakfast burrito, the tips of her hair damp from the morning surf.

Chin’s stooped over the computer tabletop, both palms braced on it. The computers going to wrack havoc with Chin’s spine, though Danny can relate to the sense of worship. He spent years in NJPD. In Danny’s experience, it takes a week to run through the criminal database and get a hit, let alone find anything useful from forensics. The backlog of cases in New Jersey was ridiculous. The smart computer Steve requisitioned for Five-0, with its thirty-second wait time, is the closest thing to television Danny’s ever seen. He’d bow to it every morning too, write odes to celebrate its snappy disposition, except he doesn’t want to disturb Chin.

“Hey,” Danny calls. “The Spanish Inquisition still here?”

“They’ve gone across the road to Ali`iolani Hale, to speak to a sentinel who processed out. Kai Nyguen? He works the x-ray scanner at the courts?” Danny nods in recognition and Chin continues. “Agent Cayser said they’re touching base with some of their vets in the area but they’re done with Steve. For now.”

Danny makes a point of swivelling his head, staring at the empty office. “He take off afterward?”

“Nah – still below decks,” Chin stands upright, popping his spine. “You know how Steve gets when there’s SAGA business.”

Danny hhmpps like a Yiddish grandmother and makes a beeline for the coffee machine. He checks the cups to make sure there’s no stains in the bottom – dirty dishes and Five-0 have a long history – then pours two and hands one over to Chin. “They did the interview in the cells? What are they, luddites? No comfort? No love?”

“They needed to record the interview for posterity. The cells are already set up for it. Steve’s office is not.”

“Huh. I should show them my phone. There’s this funny little app with a microphone on it, very handy for recording interviews.”

“Something a little more official than that, I think,” Chin says, wryly.

Kono smiles in greeting as she steps out of her office, wiping her mouth clean with the back of her hand. “Hey. I’ve been looking into the financials. Ocher made a wire transfer for twenty k. two days before his wife’s murder. The money landed in the Alpi Corporation, a hedge fund which builds robotics for versatile prosthetics. Chin and I thought we might speak to the manager this morning. You wanna come?”

Two representatives of the police force is acceptable, people get less talkative around three, and confrontational around four. Danny considers. “Go ahead. I ought to check in with our fearless leader, make sure he’s not punching a wall down there.” Find out what’s going on in Steve’s head, while Danny’s at it.

Why an official guide? Why now? For as long as Danny’s known him, Steve’s had a weird dissociation when imprints were mentioned. A sense of shame; a slow crawling revulsion.

Even when he became Category Four Steve flat-out refused, arguing guides were reserved for active military personnel, and he didn’t need one in a civilian capacity. That if he zoned, a temp guide could be dispatched from a nearby base. Not that he’d need one. Steve was a certified control freak, he didn’t slip at all before North Korea, and rarely did so now.

Thoughtfully, Danny makes his way to the elevator. Steve’s been on training exercises before with the Reserves, but he stayed within U.S waters on those occasions. What if a paired-guide is a precursor? What if he’s re-deploying overseas again? Resigning from Five-0? What if requesting Cath means their on-again-off-again relationship is all GOGOGO. He’s driving Danny crazy with endless questions

There are three holding cells in Five-0. The first is an ordinary interrogation room.

The second and third can be used in conjunction - if an eyewitness needs to be present for an interview but without the perpetrator knowing - then he or she can watch from a one-way mirror in cell number two, while the prisoner remains unaware in cell three.

When the lift opens: the first two cells are locked up tight. The doors are completely solid – ensuring privacy - with no view of the interior. It’s not practical for law enforcement but Steve has a habit of handcuffing suspects to the bolted down chair when he first brings them in. Mostly to make them as discomfited as possible. But also: to ensure he and his team can’t be attacked if they have to leave the room and return at any stage.

The only illumination comes from the last cell - where the door has been left ajar – spilling harsh fluorescent light into the corridor. “Hey, Steve!” Danny calls as he steps into the room.

There’s a sudden rush from his peripheral.

A hand locks around Danny’s right wrist, simultaneously, a forearm hits his tricep, above the elbow, jerking his arm into a straight line. The forward momentum spins Danny into the room. The back of a calf, planted directly in front of Danny’s shin, trips him over. All in all, the assailant take him to the ground in less than a second.

It’s déjà vu.

It’s as quick and as seamless as the first time he met Steven McGarrett.

Forced to his knees, one arm held in strappado, Danny yelps: “Hol’, hold!”  
  
The other guy keeps going, torquing the wrist until Danny slaps a hand against the floor, bent double. It’s white hot needles in his shoulder, flaring down the length of his entire arm. For a fraction of a second the assailant stops – holding Danny on the brink - then he pops the arm directly out of its socket.

Everything in the room ceases.

Danny’s vision goes white. Agony scours down the right side of his body.

Neatly, the other man steps away, letting his arm flop to the ground, unsupported as a puppet. Danny groans, scrambling on his good arm to push his face off the floor. Uncoordinated, he tips sideways, off his knees and onto his buttocks. Even that small movement has fire shooting up his collarbone, into his neck. He uses both feet to scoot into a corner, cradling his right arm to keep it immobilised. The dense plates of muscle - connecting shoulder and back - light up like a wildfire.

He can’t feel his fingertips.

Jake O’Brien shuts the door calmly, locking them inside. “I was hoping I could have a word,” he says, pleasantly. “ You took off the other night before I had a chance to say hi.”

Stomach awash with nausea; Danny swallows and swallows again. “See?” He rasps out. “This is why I hate meeting Steve’s old friends. You’re all bug-fuck crazy.”

He met Jake briefly, two night ago at the SandCastle Bar, when Steve invited him to meet the team, so Danny knows the following:

1: Jake’s an old boarding school buddy.  
2: Steve hasn’t seen him in years. They went in opposite directions after graduating the cadets, Steve opted for the Navy while Jake selected the Marine Corp.  
3: He’s been crashing at Steve’s house, sleeping on Danny’s couch, for days while waiting for the outcome of a conduct review.  
And 4: He’s a Category Five sentinel.

Danny high-tailed it out of the bar before they could exchange three words together. Something about Grace, something about needing to be elsewhere, something about awesome to meet you and LATER!

Danny has successfully avoided Steve, Steve’s house, Steve’s friend ever since, working the Ocher case with the HPD first responder and Kono.

Jake leans against the door, arms folded across his chest. He’s average looking the same way Danny is; pleasant enough to look at but nothing special. His eyes are the same colour as beer. His voice is husky to the point of damaged, like someone who took a vicious hit to the larynx. “Crazy, huh? Steve told me about Bull-Frog; he also said you acted like a jealous bitch the entire time.” Jake laughs, the creases around his eyes deepening. “Me? You wouldn’t even have drinks with after work. And when Steve was so keen for me to meet his new ohana, too. He was miffed, you know. He’s proud of his service; the people he met.”

“Where is he?” Danny says, numbly.

He can feel the sweat gathering between his shoulder-blades, clammy with shock. Chin said the SAGA team left. They couldn’t hustle Steve out without Kono or Chin knowing about it – there’s only one egress point from the cells and that’s the lift - which means Steve’s down here. Likely, in the opposite room, watching. Danny straightens. He layers his shields on thickly to keep everyone out. He can feel his own panic trying to take root, spreading through him like a weed. You don’t get attacked in the home of the Hawaii State Task force unless you’re confident about the outcome, or unless you’re chock-full of insanity. Danny levers himself to his feet, right arm braced.

Since the government first created the Sentinel program: they’ve boasted they can pair a military unit together with minimal violence and in a clinical setting.

They simply drug a guide until his or hers shields are non-existent - until not even a rudimentary defence is available, the type of thing a babe is born with - and put them in the same room as a sentinel.

The sentinel spends forty-eight hours imprinting all of their senses on the empath, until they can find that person as a single dot in a stadium full of people, amid explosions or warfare, whereas the empath spends the time laid out, unconscious, emotionally bare.

By the time the narcotic is out of their system; by the time their shields are fully operational again; it’s too late for the guide. His or her’s internal landscape has been irrevocably rewritten. Where it used to be one, now it is two, and keeping the sentinel outside of their shields is anathema. Conjoined, the military states, in their sanctified press release. Able to infiltrate into deep terrain, communicate near silently, anticipate each other’s needs through the gifts unique to their sub-branch of humanity, they’re an effective and deadly duo within our elite military forces.

Interwoven, Danny’s mother used to say, not to mention a bloody liability.

Neat, professional, civilised, the army counter-states: no need for bond-bites and violence if the army can achieve the same result through chemical interference. The Ivanski vs. Peterson case of 1921 will never occur again.

In the old days, sentinel’s used to hunt.

In the old days, sentinel’s used to _ask_.

In the old days – if they were feral and the empath unwilling – violence could erupt but it was rare, almost totally unheard of, until a brutal attack on an eleven year old girl in Louisiana, post Great War. The ragtime papers of the day made it a national topic, how the guide was prepubescent, the sentinel in an altered state. His acquittal, based on not being of sound mind or body at the time of the imprint (rape, the papers screamed, physically mauled others proclaimed), led to a public outcry and statewide rallies. Afterward, the U.S government got involved, and the face of the world changed forever.

“If you want, I’ll slide the humerus bone back in for you,” Jake offers, his tone solicitous.

“I don’t want, actually,” Danny mutters. “In fact, stay on the opposite side of the cell.”

Jake’s damp with perspiration, pupils blown, broadcasting hate loudly. _He’s in a jam_, Steve explained a couple of days ago_, I can’t give you the details. It’s classified_ (Danny’s favourite sentence, right up there with ‘You wouldn’t understand’), _But he’s staying with me until he’s back on his feet again._

He needs more than a place to stay, Danny reasons.

The man is twitching, random spikes that tell their own story, he looks high because he’s titrating through medical doses. The doctors must be treating him with a pharmacy’s worth of drugs, trying to uncover the magic combination to calm his misfiring senses. Jake’s breathing deeply, his exhalations so forceful they sound like ‘whuffs’. Scenting, and Danny’s entire body goes cold.

He checks the security camera over his left shoulder. The light is blinking steadily. He wonders if Chin is still on the tabletop, checking background information; wonders what the chances are someone will link into the feed, out of boredom, or concern; because who doesn’t want to watch an empty cell with no criminals inside of it? Fuck, Danny thinks, succinctly.

“I won’t give you the honorific of Guide – you weren’t raised like the rest of us – you don’t deserve the title. But you should have been. I take it you were hiding behind your momma’s skirts all these years? Instead of going to war?”

“Yeah, that’s right. Ma always wore the most striking patterns.”

“No guide but I am certain you’re an unregistered empath.” Jake glances at the one-way mirror, as if checking his own reflection, then grins. “Steve didn’t believe me, when I first said it, but he fell into line quickly enough when I presented the evidence. Mind if I prove it?”

“Come near me and I’ll have you arrested. I am not an empath, a guide, or whatever lexicology you prefer to use,” Danny snaps. “I’m baseline human, not subject to your military law. You want to add assaulting a police officer to the court martial appeal? Think you’re career would recover, Captain?” Danny’s first defence is always verbal, if he can talk or intimidate his way out of a situation he will. Hyper alert and loud, he’s also measuring the dimensions of the room, the bolted down chair, the fixed table, the amount of workable space between himself and Jake.

“Oh, my career will recover just fine. I might even say all’s forgiven… if I’m right about you.”

Danny’s piece is upstairs in the Five-0 weapons locker. His phone and badge were left on the tabletop when he went to fetch Steve. He’s trapped in a prison cell smaller than McGarrett’s kitchen with a busted arm and a Category Five sentinel madder than Jack Torrance.

Jake works his jaw wide, gathering saliva. “I figure I’ve already done some assaulting. No point stopping things now.” He comes in finally, loose limbed as a coyote.

Danny hustles, protecting his right shoulder. Every possible scenario he can imagine ends badly. Jake took out his dominant arm. The only weapons available are limbs and teeth and whatever else they brought in with them. Danny’s going to lose and lose badly. Even if he wins, the outcome is the same. Behind Jake, the reinforced mirror rattles, struck hard from the opposite room.

Jake starts with a kick: desultory, aimed straight for the kneecap.

Danny counter-blocks with his shin, taking the hit on bone without complaint. He slams his foot down, straight into O’Brien’s instep. Jake’s expression flickers, he hops backward.

Danny keeps his left fist high, protecting his face: keeps turning his wounded shoulder away. Danny’s empathy has been locked up tight since Lisa but there’s no point in keeping the charade if Jake’s planning to bite.

Cautiously, he lowers his shields a fraction.

He’s never had to explain this to Grace; but Danny’s empathy is a balancing act of input and output. Of give and take. His internal borders are nebulous; fluid, easily redrawn. He’s never possessed Steve’s steadfast certainty. He’s never had Steve’s ability to stand tall, to believe in a given outcome despite the odds set against them.

When he opens up, Danny’s flooded by righteous fury - _you’re going to pay_ – the emotion tarnished with grief. Jake O’Brien lost his entire Op team, but Jesus, what does that have to do with Danny?

And the hate feels cloying. Personal.

Under that: Danny’s pierced by another emotion – the personality behind it familiar - but the sheer violence isn’t. Borderline feral. Intense panic and rage. At the core, buried deep, it’s bruising, tender, gone soft as if its taken a hard hit to the centre mass. Danny discards it. He focuses on what he can use. The hate is enough to bolster him and he pushes into Jake’s mind with the precision of a knife. _You’re going to pay._ Danny, inverted, echoes, _Oh god, I’m going to make you pay._

Jake’s not shielded. There’s a grave in the centre of him where a guide should be; the ground salted after a burial. His mind’s easily accessible, all of his senses flung wide open.

There are categories for guides. Most are Touchstones like Joe, baseline humans who try to physically focus a sentinel on an opposing sense - if they’re spiking on sight, yell into their ear until the sentinel snaps out of it - that sort of thing. Any person on the planet can act as one, provided they recognise the sense gone haywire and do the opposite. Touchstones can’t help in an actual zone, but they can distract an unstable sentinel from falling into one, and are most effective when paired with the lower levels, the C1’s and C2’s.

Then there’s the legitimate guides (the ones branded a ‘sub-branch’ by the U.S government) whose empathy levels are extreme. They can sense a sentinel’s distress, discover pathways to counteract it, teach coping mechanisms custom-made for their chosen partner. After that – and very rarely - there are people like Danny. Guiding is the most correct term – because it’s meant to be intuitive and helpful, it’s supposed to be about giving control to a sentinel by teaching them how to use their senses properly, not by robbing them of it. But sometimes, if the sentinel is too distressed, a powerful guide can forcibly lower the influx of information. Tactical first aid. Take over for a fraction by lowering the input. Only for a minute, maybe two, until the impaired sentinel can regain equanimity and take over again. It can’t be done for long. Ideally, it shouldn’t be done at all.

Danny can see Jake’s metaphorical dial – see the imagery/emotion Jake invokes to control his five enhanced senses - and cranks it down into nothing. Jake stutters, his eyes gone huge, comically wide.

Heart in his throat, Danny eases to the left.

He watches intently, to see if Jake can track the movement.

“Fuck,” the other man says, overly loud. “That’s new.” His eyes are fixed on where Danny last stood. Jake blinks, one hand rubbing compulsively against the material of his thigh, thumb and forefinger pinching together. Danny feels a mental tug - resistance vibrating as Jake tries to dial up - to reset himself to baseline standard. Danny bares his teeth, suddenly furious, and drops Jake six feet under – straight into a deprivation tank.

The man lunges, fist flying out to where Danny stood previously.

Danny keeps shuffling to the left and hits Jake in the back of the head, as hard as he can.

It would have felled an ordinary man. It would have felled anyone with access to a pain receptor, except Jake can’t feel a thing, all of his senses hijacked. Yeah, he stumbles with the impact, both palms in front of him like a French mime but he doesn’t go down.

Danny sees the inherent problem with his plan, and curses, loudly.

There’s a second mental tug, more vigorous as Jake wrestles with the control dial. He turns about and laughs disbelievingly. “Is that the wall? I can’t feel a fucking thing. It has to be.” Then adds, triumphantly. “Knew I was right about you!”

Danny can’t keep this up for long. Projection wasn’t a defence he actively practiced as a kid; his Ma read him the riot act the one time he used it on Matt. Trying to Trojan horse a sentinel into doing the opposite of what he actually wants is a short game. On a baseline human – whose senses don’t oscillate through extremes like a sentinel does - it wouldn’t work at all.

Danny finesses with the dials, attempting to raise Jake’s sense of touch, while keeping everything else dampened into the black. It’s harder than expected. Not many sentinels are Category Five and keeping the dials separate and distinct in his mind, keeping them operating well below input, takes every ounce of concentration.

The other man breathes in again, hard like before, nostrils flaring as he whuffs.

Of the five human senses smell is the most primitive, a shot of recognition straight to the hindbrain. If Danny slips for even a second, if he lets go, it will be the first of Jake’s many freaky superpowers to come online.

Jake turns a fraction, until his blind eyes fix unerringly on Danny’s position. His voice is still too loud, his hearing deafened. “You know, the cell’s not all that big, Williams. Give me my control back, please; because if you don’t, when I hit you, it’ll be harder than it should.”

Danny dials up touch again, hovering it at low two. Jake stays where he is, immobile against the wall. Danny circles to the opposite flank. He pulls his arm in tighter, feels the shakes start down his body. The longer he delays the worse the doubt is going to be. What’s he going to do? Wait until Jake has all five senses again? Until he dislocates Danny’s other arm and bites like a cannibal?

Or is he going to dial up Jake’s sense of touch into the stratosphere? Beat a Marine Captain to death with his left hand? Take Jake to Level Ten in sensation and don’t stop kicking until his heart gives out? It wouldn’t help. It wouldn’t keep Danny’s secret if Jake died here today.

The camera’s are on, Steve’s watching or SAGA is. Either way, Danny’s certain the opposite cell is occupied.

Killing Jake would make him a murderer with no discernible gain bar his own satisfaction, and he can feel the frustration leak into his eyes. So back to the original plan. Knock Jake unconscious, sit under the camera until Chin notices, get out of the goddamn cell.

Leave. Fast. After that, there are no other choices left but to run. Take Grace and go because even if she’s not a guide there’s a chance she’ll be a sentinel. The government will watch her now. Hoping she’ll come online. Or best case scenario, the gene skips a generation – goes subterranean - before it reemerges in a later descendant. Danny’s Ma was a carrier, most of his younger siblings are too. Grace might be another carrier. Matty, Danny thinks, panicked, because he has to warn his brother. Matt’s the flip side of the coin, a sentinel, and Danny’s furious. He’s fucking livid. Because it’s not only his life Jake has shone a spotlight on, it’s Matty and Grace too.

Behind him the mirror bows - gone con-curve with the force of a body being flung at it. It’ll flex, Danny knows, but the glass is reinforced, per Steve’s regulation, and nothing is coming through.

Danny flinches. Deliberately, he forces himself not to think about who’s on the opposite side, or what they might be thinking. He would have preferred a chair, hell, he’d prefer a baseball bat – anything to keep space between them – but everything of heft in the room is bolted down. Danny takes an unsteady breath, he flicks Jake’s sense of touch up. Way up. He doesn’t care about fair play. Danny’s entire life just got ruined.

Angrily, he sinks his foot directly between Jake’s legs.

The man drops with an audible wheeze, eyes watering. His face goes white then a frantic, splotchy, red. Both hands clutch at his privates as he keels forward. Danny follows through with a left handed punch. With his opposite arm out of commission his balance is off, and Jake dropped closer to the floor than expected. It’s a glancing blow rather than a solid hit. Jake stumbles, gone to his knees with one hand braced on the floor. By happenstance, he also brushes the outside of Danny’s shoe.

Jake’s hand closes like a vice.

The sudden jerk takes Danny off his feet, airborne, until he crashes down. The bones of his dislocated arm collide. The world goes muffled, strange.

Blind, Jake swarms up his body hand-over-hand, and sits in the concave of his belly. Danny’s good arm, wrestled above his head, is pinned by one of Jake’s. Jake’s other hand is curled into a fist, and it falls as if from a huge height.

The first punch has a double impact, his head ricochets from the blow and bounces off the concrete floor. He bites his tongue, his control stutters. The second punch cuts Danny’s cheek wide open.

Rage infuses him - seemingly from all sides – his drawbridge stuck at half-mast, the gears seized. He can’t stop fighting. Four years of stress, lies, Hawaii, and Steve McGarrett, and now that it’s come to a head, he can’t stop fighting. Steve.

The rage is urging him to attack, shift, move. Move, Danny! Goddammit! Move!

“See? There you are,” Jake murmurs. His thumb slides sweetly through the blood running down Danny’s cheek. He puts his face in close. “I can see you now.”


	2. Tuesday the 12TH - 09:11am

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “See? There you are. I can see you now.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There are some pretty dark themes that run throughout this story, including issues of consent, threats of rape, and physical violence. If you have any questions feel free to contact me. On the plus side, er, it’s gets better...? Eventually?
> 
> It’s pretty obvious this story hasn’t been beta-read and the style can be choppy. Helpful criticism is more than welcome.

With one arm trapped, the opposite dislocated, Danny digs his heels in, bucks his hips up and manages to unseat Jake from his perch.

Jake lurches forward. He scoots over the top of Danny’s head and spins on his knees. Jake hits out with a rabbit punch, knuckles digging into the diaphragm. Jake gets a hand on his hip before he can collapse from the arch and flips him, straight onto his belly. Sprawling on top, using his body as a dead weight, Jake snakes a forearm around his throat and starts to constrict. He keeps his head lowered, temple against Danny’s ear to prevent head butts, chin hooked over his dislocated shoulder, and tightens around him like a snake. In their squirming and rolling, they’ve both inched closer to the mirror. Jake waits until he catches Danny’s eye in the reflection then sets his teeth against the exposed nape, warningly.

No, Danny thinks, stop, _stop_. The sound he actually makes is low, inaudible. The fight drains out of him. Blood roars in his ears, oxygen depleted as Jake crushes his windpipe, the slide toward unconsciousness inevitable. When his limbs start to slacken, Jake grabs a zip tie from his pockets and wrestles Danny’s good arm behind his back. The memory of having his arm jerked out of its socket is enough to get him protesting, but Jake loops the plastic tie through the leather belt on Danny’s pants, and fastens his left wrist to it, kept low and in the centre of his spine, he doesn’t worry about the dislocated shoulder. Sitting back on his heels, Jake jerks Danny upright until they’re both kneeling tall. The agony skyrockets as his arm is twisted in the other mans’ grip. He almost pitches forward into the mirror. Seriously, he thinks about turning his head and vomiting all over Jake’s torso in retaliation. Danny pants. In the mirror they’re clothes are askew, concrete rash and bruises in equal measure, half the buttons on his shirt gone missing.

Jake laughs the same way Steve does when he’s exhilarated or had a close call, when there’s been truly spectacular sex with Catherine, his expression takes on a giddy turn.

“SAGA knows: man, when they see what you just pulled off. I’ve been running a Hunt and Extraction team for years but that’s the first time anyone’s crawled inside and shut everything off.” Jake rolls his forehead against Danny’s spine. His teeth nip at the shirt, pinching it together but not puncturing the skin. “It didn’t take long to convince them when I laid the evidence out. A few drinks: a long chat with Steve and the rest of Five-0, they didn’t mind talking, hell, half of Steve’s sentences start with Danny this or Danny that, my partner who I love very much…he told some interesting yarns.” Jake snorts, derisive. “Four operational senses and the only one he’s missing is an enhanced sense of smell. I knew exactly what you were.”

“But you know how Steve is – trust issues out of the wazoo!” Jake goads. “Must have felt like being stabbed in the guts; knowing you’d lied for years. He applied for Cath as a guide, wanted to make sure you weren’t screwing around with his head, unannounced. Guides are supposed to teach. They’re supposed to give me what _I_ want, because when we’re connected, it’s what _you_ want. Sentinels want to know how to use their senses without falling into a zone? Then a guide’s going to do their damndest to find a way, and keep trying, until they work out a solution, because it’s what _I_ want. A sentinel can’t close his mind off against an empath, because everything inside of us is hardwired to remain open, receiving information, then you’re going to extend those shields and protect us, because it’s what _I_ want. In return, we’ll fight, defend, kill for you. We’ll use all five senses to search you out. We’ll give you an emotional homing point - if your own shields falter - you’ll recognise _me_ first, you’ll recognise _us_, you won’t ever get lost in someone else’s head. We’re supposed to be reciprocal. Symbiotic. But first, there’s gotta be trust. And that’s Steve’s sticking point, isn’t it? He only gives it the once, once it’s gone, it’s gone.” Jake pats him. His face screws up in dislike, fingers flicking at Danny’s ‘cheap’ shirt, not sentinel approved. “I imagine Catherine will replace you on Five-0. Steve put the paperwork in two days ago.”

The panic keeps doubling up, Danny shunts it aside impatiently because hello, he’s not an idiot. He’s halfway to yelling out denials, halfway to crowing in victory, and in between those two meeting points, Danny is entirely himself.

Jake’s spilling out government propaganda like it’s gospel, like drugging a guide until their defences are non-existent is the way it’s always been done. The only way it could be done. What happened to their oral history? To the stories Danny was raised on, to the history shared between his grandfather, mother, and siblings? It’s as if Jake’s knowledge begins and ends in 1921. It’s as if Jake doesn’t know a damn thing about their kind. Jake talks about his idea of a reciprocal relationship without even a hint of irony.

Jake’s the type of guy who likes his own voice, apparently, because his tone becomes musing. “It takes forty-eight hours if we follow military procedure, if we let the government induce a chemical bond, if we keep things sanctified and clean. But I’m curious about the old ways, aren’t you, how long do you think it would take if I just bit? Longer than forty-eight hours, less?” Jake has one arm banded across his chest, keeping their bodies flush, the other pulls on Danny’s bicep, torquing the connective tissue and ligaments until he moans, biting his lip bloody to stop the scream. “Can you answer me this, because I’ve always wanted to know, when I get hard are you gonna feel the same lust, the same way I feel it? Are you gonna get it up for me, because I want? _Come_? When I push into your body? Some imprints are platonic – Steve and Freddie certainly were, the military actually encourages it - but Jesus, I wanna feel you squirm…” Jake lets his fingers drop, play over Danny’s fly. “SAGA set this up with Steve’s permission and with Cath on the way he didn’t mind if I took the leftovers.”

Danny tries, he really does, but he can’t help snorting. He laughs even harder when he sees the expression Jake pulls in reaction. Offended, a little bit poleaxed, as if he weren’t prepared to have his evil diatribe interrupted.

Jake O’Brien’s right: if Steve ever learned the truth about Danny he’d be hurt, pissed, rightfully mad.

Steve did his four years mandatory service and then signed on for a decade more. Steve had lived, breathed, _adored_ the Navy for more than half his life; and he might not understand how Danny could take one look at that as a kid and say ‘Nope’.

They’ve never talked about the politics.

Steve might hate him because he lied.

He might hate Danny because he dodged: when so many others couldn’t.

Steve might hate him because there’s a broken bridge – where trust should obviously exist - but he wouldn’t approve of this. Steve might have hand-delivered him to SAGA (and Danny sincerely hopes he hadn’t, can’t make himself believe that, even now), but if Steve _had_, then it would be to the medical units, not to a brutal and uneven fight in a locked cell. Of that, Danny has no doubt.

Jake’s even more of an asshole if he thinks Steve actually would.

Jake’s been performing like a C-grade actor in a D-grade movie since he first attacked and none of his verbal diarrhoea has been for Danny’s benefit, he’s not the intended audience here, it’s the man on the opposite side of the glass. If Danny’s collateral damage, a way for Jake to twist the knife and maximise the damage, then the least he can do is let Steve know he’s not buying the character assassination. They might not see each other again after today. Danny won’t allow Steve to believe he’d thought the worst of him.

“My nine year old daughter can manipulate people better than you,” Danny wheezes. “Physical violence. Emotional isolation. Alienate from any remaining friends. Undermine support. Christ, what are you doing, reading out of the Abusive Playbook for Dummies? When Steve said the army was full of rejects I thought he was exaggerating. Hello, Detective! You think I didn’t notice the other cells were locked. And since there’s no escaping the elephant in the room; empath, you moron! You think I can’t feel the six foot battering ram raging in the opposite room? You better hope the army hides us deep; because if Steve gets wind of where they’re training us, he’ll rip you apart limb from limb.”

“Oh,” Jake says, delighted, and refocuses his attention. “I really am going to fuck you open…. After this, the only person you’ll ever feel again is me.”

Jake’s teeth bear inward, slowly, going from threat to stark reality as he breaks the skin, lacerates the tissue.

Danny arches, spine curving. Jake widens his mouth, he chews harder, not to increase the rate of toxicity but to feel the pressure against his jaw. Danny tries to look past his own reflection, to see into the darkness of the other room. He hopes he makes eye contact with wherever Steve is standing, hopes he reads the apology Danny can’t voice. Eleven military bases on one island and it’s a miracle Danny lasted as long as he had. None of it is Steve’s fault.

Danny can feel his drawbridge rattling to the ground, the chains unspooled, the wheelhouse destroyed. Without his shields the empathy rises up from deep inside of him, stronger than before, no barriers left to keep it in check. He goes semi erect, body trapped between opposing forces.

He cycles between low-grade sexual excitement on one side, budding horror on the other.

Forcibly, Jake draws him away from the mirror, mouth hot on his nape, teeth embedded. With the added distance, Jake’s emotions coalesce, become more tangible, the sense of ‘other’ fading into nonexistence. Want beats in Danny’s ears. Endorphins, adrenalin, dopamine and oxytocin flood his system, the sense of victory ratchets into a sweet need for release. Danny’s always loved fighting

(arguing!)

and fucking

(loving! slow sex, lazy sex, goofy smiles in the morning sex!),

but everything is blurring together, melding into one, the lines no longer distinct. He feels -

“Yeah,” Jake says, amused. “You’re gonna come when I do.”

Lust, gone hard between the legs –

and under that, coming closer to the surface –

is a sense of dominance.

Danny stares at the mirror, lets the reflection fill him up, then projects with everything he has left.

With a soft sound of dissent, Jake collapses. Danny follows, unconscious, a heartbeat later.

  
***

_(When it comes to an unshielded empath, the medical officer said, consent is a tricky concept. You better treat them how you want to be treated, son._

***

  
Kono’s at the weapons locker when she hears dispatch squawk over the radio.

She selects the Ruger KP90 from the rack, checking the pistol for obstructions before she drops the clip into her hand. Kono’s attention is only half on what’s she doing, the rest is monitoring the background chatter; listening as dispatch directs an EMT unit to Ali`iolani Hale. The judicial heart of Hawaii is across the road from Five-0 Headquarters and the call’s in response to a female sentinel, in her early twenties, who collapsed unexpectedly.

It’s not relevant to her team, so Kono lets the information fall into the recesses of her awareness.

Letting the cage door swing shut with a bang; Kono squats down, balanced on her toes as she tends to the lower drawer. She punches in the code, sorting through the ammunition boxes one by one. The boss has issues, so many issues, but Kono loves his hoarding heart. Steve McGarrett steals people, weapons, vehicles, and on a whole, refuses to return any of it.

In the distance, she can hear the ambulance approaching.

Across the room, Chin tilts his head as he tracks the sirens. He shuts the computer down and moves from the tabletop. It’s about a thirty-five minute drive to Alpi Robotics - another twenty if the traffic is bad - which in Oahu, is any day ending in a Y. He drops his coffee cup in the sink and gives it a cursory wash before he sidles to the window to check the situation.

There’s a white van parked across the road, the type of vehicle preferred by tradies and surveillance units the world over. As he watches, a young woman emerges, cellphone to her ear, and looks up at Iolani Palace.

The ambulance screams by, lights flashing. It pulls a semi-circle then comes to a stop outside the historic building on the opposite side. “They’re headed to the judicial offices,” he says.

The radio squawks again.

Kono puts aside her half-filled clip, the box of ammunition, and lopes to the scanner, turning the sound up marginally. Her expression goes intent. “They’ve called another unit for Ali`iolani Hale. Kai Nyugen just collapsed.”

“Two sentinels?” Chin asks, dubiously.

Kono bites her lip: “Were they targeted?”

“Kai’s a C1, taste only. He opted out of the military when he was twenty-two,” Chin shakes his head. “He can zone if he’s concentrating on food but it’s unlikely, and Kai knows better than to let that happen at work.”

“Well, it happened. Dispatch is advising Pearl they need general guides on hand. They’re asking the military to forward personnel to Queens.”

Most hospitals have a single guide assigned to the rotation but they’re limited, and the guides can only attend one sentinel at a time. If there’s an influx, the hospitals look to the numerous bases dotted across the island for help.

Two more ambulances wail down King Street, one screeches to a stop in front of Ali`iolani Hale, perpendicular to the first bus on scene, and the other barrels onward. Chin cranes his neck, watching as the vehicle takes a right turn into Richards Street, and vanishes. The sirens stop, not even a distant echo to be heard.

“It’s on the other side of Iolani Palace,” Kono confirms. “Third call came through dispatch for a C2 on leave. He collapsed on the street below us.”

Uneasily, Chin straightens from the window. “Check on Steve. Now.”

Kono’s halfway to the elevator when the glass doors to their building swing open. A man in cammies, with CAYSER emblazoned on the uniform, and the woman from the white van step into the room. They’re followed by three others. One has a medical bag slung over her shoulder, the other two carry ballistic syringes, .50 calibre dart guns, the black barrels whippet thin.

Kono hesitates then takes the last four steps to the elevator; more worried about Steve. She hits the button for the basement.

Chin watches the new arrivals before he asks tersely: “Three sentinels just fell. Is it localised or island wide?”

The lift pings as it arrives.

Cayser doesn’t even pretend to misunderstand. “Two ex-vets and a serving officer, all collapsed within three hundred yards of the building. No other reports outside of the radius. If it’s not too much trouble, Officer Kalakaua: could you hold the door?”

Kono glances at Chin. Her cousin says belatedly. “This is Alex Cayser, from Sentinel and Guide Affairs. He was interviewing Steve earlier this morning, and - ?”

“Lisa Williams,” the woman introduces. She doesn’t offer her hand. “We were still in the area when the EMT calls came through.”

Chin’s face is tight, unhappy. It’s obvious he doesn’t want these people here; it’s also obvious he can’t wave SAGA away if there’s a legitimate threat. He looks at the two agents then beyond, to the soldiers, and gestures toward the elevator. It’s a crowd, too small a space for seven grown adults to fit comfortably, but Kono and Chin aren’t staying behind.

When the lift opens, all three cells are locked up tight.

Kono stutters in surprise. Her balance shifts to the balls of her feet, weight lowered into her knees.

Chin visibly falters, anger flashing as he snaps aloud: “You locked Steve in? Why? What room did you interview him in?”

“We need to get to the third,” Lisa interrupts.

Waspishly, Kono gets in her face. “Where do you get off – “

“We were testing a theory,” Cayser interrupts. He makes a ‘simmer down’ gesture. “No harm was meant. From our side Commander McGarrett is perfectly safe.”

This is their building, this is Five-0 Headquarters, and Steve McGarrett is the commander of their task force. Upset doesn’t begin to cover it.

SAGA credentials aside, Kono’s hand drops low, to where her holster should be. Chin simply strides by the lot of them, headed for the last cell in the row. At the door, the two soldiers catch up, standing either side with their weapons semi raised. Chin grimaces, hand poised over the key-code. “What’s in the darts?”

“Seventy-five milligrams of combelen,” one of the faceless men says. “It’ll take down a grown adult in forty-five seconds flat. No one’s getting hurt here.”

Chin punches 363827 into the lock and swings the door open. There is no threat. Only two unconscious bodies, neither of which is Steve.

Kono darts by. Uncaring of the blood, she crouches beside the older Detective and checks for a pulse. Danny’s face is slack. He doesn’t respond to her ministrations. Kono spares a single glance at O’Brien, realises he’s out of it, and promptly ignores him. She skims her hands over Danny’s neck, shoulders; blood is pooling in the suprasternal notch, where his collarbones strive to meet, there’s deep bruising all around his throat, an obvious bite wound. Danny’s shoulder is misshapen, opposite arm twisted behind his back and zip-tied to his belt. The medic drops in beside her. The woman cuts the plastic tie first, then slices the blue shirt from cuff to shoulder, peeling it away.

The mirror jumps.

Simultaneously, everyone in the room looks up.

Cayser breaks away from the group. “Commander McGarrett, you need to calm down. Tap the window twice, without trying to put your entire fist through it.” As an aside, he mutters. “If he keeps throwing himself at the glass like that, he’s going to damage himself.”

The tempo turns chaotic, furious.

“Yeah,” one of the soldiers rasps into the short silence. “That doesn’t seem calm and reasonable to me.” He double checks his weapon, taps his partner once on the shoulder, and slinks from the room.

“Steve!” Chin calls, sharply. He’s hoping recognition will work in their favour; Steve prefers chaos, the more mayhem the smoother Steve operates, he might be smack-bang in the middle of a disaster but in Chin’s experience their leader is rarely out of control. The thought Steve might be now is enough to make his skin go icy. “Brah, they’re going to drug you if you don’t calm down. Can you imagine what Danny would say? He already calls you an animal. He’d tease you all the way to the grave if you went feral. Come on, Steve. You’re not going to tear your way into this room with your bare hands alone, you _know_ that. Tap the window, show us you’re rational.” Chin listens breathlessly. The banging doesn’t cease. Cursing, Chin bolts from the room. He doesn’t know what he intends to do, demand the right to enter first, stop this before it escalates further, talk Steve down, ask everyone what the hell is going on?

The soldiers are doing a silent three finger count when Chin appears in the corridor. They swing the cell door open, tilt forward, and fire a single dart into the room.

Steve comes at them like a blur. Terrifyingly fast. Before they can get the door shut, he slams one of the men into the opposite wall. The impact knocks the man’s helmet off. It spins across the floor like a bottle top. The second soldier grabs McGarrett from behind, managing a choke-hold. Steve side-steps. He slams an elbow into the newly exposed midriff. Steve’s opposite arm reaches back, curling around the soldiers nape. He drops, lurching forward at the hips, and flips the other man straight over his shoulder. Steve follows him to the ground, two hard punches to the nose and Chin can hear the cartilage crack, see the soldier go rag-doll slack.

Thirty seconds, all in all, from the moment the dart was fired to the moment Steve stares at him, flat-eyed, in the corridor. The pupils are constricted, pinpoint black and so much for recognition. Steve’s half-crouched, knuckles against the soldiers’ chest. He pushes off from the body like a runner at the mark.

Cayser steps around Chin. Neatly, sidearm raised, he fires two more darts at centre mass.


	3. Two Steps Forward: Three Steps Back

  
Sound is the first thing that comes on-line.

For Steve it’s always been sound, followed by sight.

Later, much much later, there was touch and taste too, there were weekly meets with a therapist and a temp guide at MBCH, there was Danny sleeping on his couch for a solid week after North Korea. Getting a grip on two new senses wasn’t easy – none of it was, not when Steve could see Danny stumble out of bed, hair askew, see the muscle definition in his shoulders, and find himself wondering if Danny were a gym junkie or preferred old-style boxing rings, if maybe Steve could coax him into a session. If he could touch Danny – if Danny would allow him to dial up, and dial up, discover the new apexes - or maybe run a hand over his belly, taste between his legs, lick into the core of him – two brand new senses running rampant, giving rise to all the thoughts Steve had been nursing quietly for years, but none of it was as difficult as the therapist had made it out to be. Steve had a handle on it. Steve’s self-control was legendary. ‘Sides, Danny moved out of the house again before it got tested. Touch, they said, was the most hazardous of the five senses, it was something you could get lost in. For Steve, though, it’s always sound that kicks in first.

If he listens beyond the room, he can make out the rain striking the pavement: one of Hawaii’s lightning fast downpours, clogging up the drains with rubbish and flooding the streets with brown water. If he listens beyond that, he can hear a bird ruffling its waterlogged feathers irritably, a girl squealing as she darts from shop to shop, trying to avoid the worst of the downpour. Things are fuzzy inside his head, the landscape drowned in sodium yellow – like the streetlamp outside Joe White’s office at the Naval Amphibious Base in Coronado – where the rain was so much colder. Freddie’s face was set, fingertips reaching for the bell –

-and if he rang it, Steve was out too.

They were a paired unit. If one went, _both_ went. He remembers crashing into the other man, tackling him to the ground, desperate and angry and trying to keep them both in BUD/s. They fought in the muck like school boys until Joe White broke them apart. _Your old man was so proud,_ Steve hollered, because if fists didn’t work maybe guilt would. _Christ, Freddie, he was so happy when he saw we were headed for the SEALS._ Steve was proud. He’d decided, even before he presented as a sentinel, he was going into the Navy. Becoming a SEAL was a lifetime ambition.

They’d talked about it. They talked about it after boarding school, discussed it before they headed to the Naval Academy; they weighed the pros and cons in Intelligence. Steve had asked, before reenlistment, he had asked and asked again. Freddie said hell yeah.

But Freddie’s face went flat, combative. The two of them argued until Steve said hoarsely ‘_listen to me, listen. **Don’t**. Please, don’t. Because you’ll regret it, man; you’ll regret it for the rest of your life’,_ because Steve knew his partner, knew his nature, and this wasn’t him. It was a pity party, a moment of self-doubt, and Steve could snap Freddie out of it given enough time. Because Steve couldn’t imagine failing. Steve was twenty-two and desperate to prove himself. _You want this,_ Steve whispered, _you **want** this_, until the other man shuddered and went still.

Steve didn’t have the guts to ask: are you just exhausted, man, tired to the bone? Or are you scared? He couldn’t find a way to frame the question without it sounding like an insult.

Freddie changed after that night - like a slow moving weather pattern - and he was good, he was the best damn sailor Steve ever served with. Freddie came first in everything. “He’s a good reflection of you,” Joe said, upon graduation, and Steve had wanted to punch his commanding officer in the face, feeling sick at the idea. Because Steve didn’t get to take credit for that: because Joe didn’t get to diminish Freddie’s achievements with an offhand remark. Because they _both_ wanted their tridents (they did, they had!) -

-and there wasn’t room for self doubt.

After Freddie died, Steve spent years reexamining that night, wondering about the order of events. Wondering - until the thought made him nauseous - if he might have done something he shouldn’t have, taken advantage. He can’t tell for certain, Steve’s not an empath. It’s four years too late to ask Freddie, and grief has a way of changing perception, of altering the reality of events. Truth is, he’ll never know.

The idea of it doesn’t sit well with Steve.

In Steve’s personal timeline, from the moment they apprehended Anton Hesse in North Korea until provisions were made to transfer the terrorist onto U.S soil, less than eight days had passed. Steve lost not only his guide, but his father, in little over a week.

“Steve?” She murmurs. The voice is warm, soft as bedsheets. A hand brushes his forehead, follows the curve of his ear. “Steve, I need you to come back. Two hundred and fifteen milligrams of combelen to the chest, sailor. You sleep any longer and someone’s going to mistake you for Sleeping Beauty.”

Cath never insults him. It’s always ‘Hey gorgeous’ or at her voracious best, a purred ‘Pretty boy, sailor.’ _I’ll take that_, Steve had laughed, and tumbled them both into bed.

The first time he met Danny, Danny did nothing _but_ insult him. Danny said: ‘_listen to me, you institutionalised freak! I have a daughter! I am not getting killed for your vendetta!_’ He’d been angry, jabbing his finger into Steve’s chest. And Steve jerked his arm high, crowded in close, he hadn’t even thought about what he was doing or why.

If pressed: he’d argue it was because of Freddie. Steve had collided with Detective Williams two days after his father’s death, a mere eight days after his guide died in North Korea, trying to secure Anton Hesse for the United States government. Steve was oscillating through medical doses, his vision dulled to greys, hearing no better than a stodgy old grandfather, but he was seeing reminders of Freddie everywhere.

And the thing was: Williams didn’t resemble Hart in the least, but Freddie’s grin was written under Danny’s anger (it’s a girl!) and Danny’s resentment was underscored by Freddie’s regret (Tell her, Steve, I loved her) and Steve broke into a thousand shards at the memory, edged with self-recrimination.

Fifty-five minutes into Danny’s company, and it’s the civilian cop who saves the SEAL; it’s Danny hollering at him – making Steve accountable to his little girl - until something molten crept through his fissures like a lava flow. Almost dislocating Danny’s shoulder wasn’t sane nor civil. Staring dark-eyed at the two HPD officers who had shifted nervously on their feet, wasn’t calming the situation down.

Until fifty minutes ago, Danny _was_ HPD. The transfer wasn’t common knowledge, those men had been his co-workers.

If Steve saw someone treat one of his SEALS like that – forcing them to their knees – he would have been up in their faces and all over that shit in seconds.

He stared challengingly at the two officers, and the two officers looked away. Steve’s lip curled in contempt. He leant closer. His t-shirt was sodden from the earlier downfall, from the exertion of the chase, and his blood was up. He wanted to grab Danny by the hair, focus his attention on those two officers lurking nearby because they didn’t care, they weren’t going to help. Except Danny must have realised he wasn’t getting aid from that quarter. He was Haole. No one had his back on this island.

Steve will - Steve intends to – as soon as Danny falls in line.

Steve could feel the pulse under his hand, quick as a humming bird; there was a weird scent in the air, stronger after the rains. Danny’s nape was tiger-striped, pale where his shirt collar habitually sat, tinged pink by the sun higher up. Steve’s vision telescoped, sharpened on the juncture between collar-bone and neck. Steve held him there a fraction longer, oddly mesmerised, then breathed out, shaken. Because what was he doing? What was he even thinking?

The two uniforms were still watching; there was a crowd of lookie-loos lurking near the trailers. Danny’s left arm, where the bandage sat, was speckled with fresh blood. Deliberately, Steve relaxed, took the situation down a notch.

“You don’t have to like me but I have a job to do, and I’m the only one who can do it, so you are going to work with me.”

“Alright,” Danny grated out, teeth clenched. “Fine. Now let me go.”

Steve had. Confrontation over, not even a blip on the radar-screen as far as he was concerned, the flare-up dealt with. Steve had turned away, thoughts already on the smuggling ring, on how Victor Hesse had arrived on the island. Seventy-five minutes later, Steve’s jaw was aching like it had been hit by a wrecking ball.

Danny, apparently, didn’t do public humiliation. He sure as hell didn’t obey orders silently.

On the ride back, Steve kept poking his tongue into the corner of his cheek, checking his teeth were present. The silence in the car was deafening. There was a palpable wall where there hadn’t been before and Steve was winding the windows down, head aching, because he wanted to catch that scent again, the elusive one in the rain – only to find it gone, dispersed like a dull memory.

Sorry, Steve said. Admittedly - there were better ways he could have handled the situation. His senses were misfiring, so far out of whack, he hadn’t slept more than three hours since dad died. If SEALS taught you one thing: it was excuses didn’t cover shit. So his apology sounded tart - even to his own ears – Freddie was sitting in the backseat, grinning ruefully, Danny was arguing that if you got your partner shot you apologised, and Steve was thinking about a wet night under a glistening bell, about little girls growing up without their fathers, and how Danny was so determined to be a good one. A great one.

He wanted to meet her suddenly, wanted to know her, because Grace was Danno’s, and Danno was now his responsibility and Steve was done, utterly done, with losing people.

There’s just enough Jersey in Danny’s voice to register his new partner as ‘alien’ among the many locals, so Steve’s hearing hones in on it instantly.

Despite Freddie and his dad, despite two spectacular hits in a week, Steve doesn’t zone in the aftermath. He halved his medication after arriving in Hawaii, then a week later, stopped using it altogether. Colours came back, stronger, brighter, and Steve didn’t unravel. Every night he dreamt of shots fired over the telephone, of the way Freddie stared at the bell.

Steve’s bleeding internally, he’s walking wounded, but no one here knows him well enough to see the signs. He can’t dwell on might-have-beens or what-ifs, Steve’s an operator, those type of doubts will drive a person insane, but alternate outcomes seep into the cornerstones of his dreams. Freddie alive, both of them in the Navy if not the SEALs, Freddie holding his daughter to his chest, Freddie trying to squeeze every moment into those short years before the government took her away.

He’d never admit it to anyone, but stepping back from the Navy, into Five-0, couldn’t have come at a better time for Steve. He needed something different. A distraction from everything he had been raised with. He can’t think about being operational in the military again, about SAGA foisting another guide on him, he can’t think about waking up in the med-unit, meeting someone’s eyes for the first time and not knowing who or what they were beforehand, about how severe the changes might have been. There’s a sense of growing horror that he can’t compartmentalise anymore. At least he had known Freddie before they were paired; gone to boarding school together, and Steve had done his best, his absolute best, not to abuse the connection. But he can’t –

-he won’t go down that road again.

Because best doesn’t cut it. Because best doesn’t mean there aren’t slip ups.

Instead Steve concentrates on his new task force, revels in the liberties allowed to him, he had his hate for Hesse to keep him running and when that ran out, he had a Jersey loudmouth to keep him situated: and then, inexplicably, there was a little girl running up and down his beach, an entire team of misfits camped out on the lanai, and Steve had a family.

“Steve,” she insists, louder, mouth beside his ear. “I know three darts to the chest is a lot to take, but if you do not open your eyes in the next minute, I will personally put the Marrakech photos online. You remember that R&R, Steven? How would you care to explain that to Kono and Chin?”

Steve stirs. His fingers twitch against his sentinel approved clothing and release, only to curl inward again helplessly.

“Steve,” she says. “They took the audio and visual recordings from the cells, they were piggy-backing your security system, watching from the van parked in the street. They’re submitting it as evidence to JAG. I have an application here in triplicate, saying you requested me as a full time guide, which SAGA approved, by the way. Me, Steven! So before they drag us both to a medical centre to induce a chemical bond, wake up!”

Steve hits the floor, nose to the tiles, palms flat. An adrenaline surge chases the last traces of combelen from his system. Steve pants, wide awake. A lifetime of military habits squashes the disorientation. He recognises his office, the black couch pressed up hard against the wall. Understanding they’ve moved Steve to make him more comfortable doesn’t appease the loss of autonomy. The last place he recalls with clarity was the subbasement. _Danny_

Steve scrambles upright. He lurches toward the wooden desk like a drunkard.

Outside, the rain is coming down in sheets, furious and spiteful. The nearby vegetation has gone a vibrant green with the wet, sagging under the weight of the downpour. The grassland in front of Ali`iolani, where the lawyers and clerics often eat outside at midday, is deserted. Muddy pools form in the exposed roots of the banyan trees. The parrots are quiet.

Catherine Rollins rocks back on her heels. Her expression cycles between cautious and overly concerned. There’s a pang that comes with the ingrained wariness; they’d met when they were carefree, without any expectations between them but the promise of fun. It had been easy once. Now it was fraught with unspoken words. “Are you good? Do you remember where you are?”

Do you remember who you are, she means.

“Where is he?”

“Danny or O’Brien?”

“Either. Both. I’m going to kill him.”

“Again,” Catherine says, nonplussed. “Which one are we talking about here?”

Steve’s fists are bloody, knuckles busted open, his shoulder sore from repeated strikes to the glass. His head is aching from the combelen but starting to clear, events reordering into a proper structure. _Jake made him watch._ Stuck on the opposite side of the glass - Jake was going to make him watch _all_ of it. “Danny, Cath. Where did they take him?”

Cath lays her hand over his forearm. “Steve, listen to me, you can’t go off half-cocked. In fact, you can’t go anywhere near Danny. No one can at the moment. Cayser had him transferred to an isolation ward. No sentinels. No visitors. No medical personnel for longer than thirty minutes at a time until the toxin is out of his system. And O’Brien nowhere – absolutely nowhere – near him for forty-eight hours. Do you understand? Until he has rudimentary shielding again, isolation is the best place for Danny. The military has the proper facilities to protect him. But if you go in there waving your gun and shouting- ”

“Trust me, I’m not getting close. I’m standing guard. Right outside Danny’s door; but yes: there’s going to be plenty of shouting going on.”

Cath re-examines him, her mouth curving upward before she looks away. There’s a piece of paper on his desk, a crease line down the middle where it’s been folded in half. “O’Brien’s ‘claim’ wasn’t sanctioned by SAGA. He was supposed to prove his theory, not imprint on Danny or force an empathic connection. Cayser’s given his word they won’t move Detective Williams off the island until his case can be reviewed.”

“Which. Base?”

“Marine Corp, Base Hawaii.” Steve’s fists curl inward until the knuckles start bleeding afresh, Cath grimaces, as if aware of how the words will be taken. “It’s tradition. Technically, he was O’Brien’s catch.”

“Danny’s not built for the military, you know him, he’s not. Hell, he’d give away our position in thirty seconds.”

Cath stares, perplexed, when she speaks her cadence is off, as if slipping into someone else’s perspective. “He has tactical training, his groupings on the firing range are impressive, and you and I both know a forced connection can alter behavioural issues in a guide. If you’re going to argue he doesn’t ‘fit the mould’ then I’d say SAGA has heard it all before.”

He needs his uniform. Steve grabs his weapon from the locked drawer, his badge, and pushes passed Cath and out the door. He clatters down the steps three at a time. The government had provided Steve with his education, gave him meals, a bed, saw to his medical needs and provided a safe environment to learn in, four years mandatory service after boarding school hadn’t seemed like a big deal, more like paying off a debt he had accrued. Steve was happy to do it, and when he was finally in the Navy, he loved it. “Safe? For how long, until SAGA sanctions a paired unit? Until they drug him, on purpose this time?”

“Safe until his case can be reviewed,” Cath looks at him evenly, no judgment in her eyes, no recrimination, only a statement of fact. “He broke the law.”

“He wasn’t raised by the government, Cath. He owes the state nothing.”

“Steve – “

“He’s been a cop since he was eighteen. He’s already serving the community. They think that doesn’t count? They can’t – “

“Steve – “

“They can’t have him!” Steve hollers.

“Oh! Congrats to your inner five year old! Can I have a conversation with your outer man now, too? Jesus, Steve.”

“I found him first.” He stops, mouth open, panting, and shakes his head. Steve quiets. “I found him _first_, Cath.”

“You’re a mess and half drugged,” Cath says. There’s steel in her eyes, a measure of alarm. “If SAGA asks, you need to be careful how you word your reply, Steve, harbouring a fugitive is a punishable offence.” He can see the unspoken question in her eyes: Did you know? Not really, he thinks. On some level, he might have known since day one. 

He thinks he worded his reply concisely and he’s prepared to argue it, consequences be damned. In some ways, it’s not about Danny at all, but about Grace, swimming in the ocean with her, side by side, her face shining with laughter. Ice-cream on the tip of her nose. She was Danny’s, and Danny was his, and that made them Steve’s responsibility, because she wasn’t going to grow up without her father and Steve wasn’t letting Danny go. He’ll resign from Five-0 if it comes to it, he’ll go back in

He wants to find O’Brien, kill him, but he needs to get to MCBH first. Steve hauls himself up into the truck, waits until Catherine slams the door shut, and guns the engine.


End file.
